Screenwriter Wesley Strick ("Doom," "Arachnophobia") is using the strike to work on his second novel. "I write in the morning and picket in the afternoon," he said. Although his scripts pay the bills, he enjoys the process of writing fiction, the discursive nature of the storytelling.
"As a screenwriter, you're always looking for things to cut," Strick said. "Scripts are all about economy and forward momentum, whereas novels can be big, baggy receptacles for a story. When I go back to screenwriting, I feel like I've been put back in my cage."
A former advertising copy writer, Jim Jennewein has written the films "Richie Rich," "The Flintstones" and "Getting Even With Dad" with his partner Tom S. Parker. But even for a successful writer like Jennewein, the "spin cycle" of endless story meetings, dumb notes and production green lights that turn to red has taken its toll on his muse.
"The process is less than satisfying," said Jennewein, who grew up loving the adventure stories of Jack London. "You get tired and burned out, and I always wanted to write novels anyway." So Jennewein and Parker are focusing on a trilogy of books for the young-adult market. Tentatively titled "Rune Warriors," the series, which will be published by HarperCollins, is a Viking saga that Jennewein describes as a mix of Harry Potter and "The Princess Bride," "with a little 'Python' thrown in."
Like Smith's "Moist," "Rune Warriors" was plucked from an old script idea that Jennewein and Parker had. Since the strike started, they've hunkered down to finish the second and possibly third volumes.
"Authorial ownership of the words just doesn't happen with screenwriters," Jennewein said. "Everyone treats it [the script] as a suggestion, while writing fiction is a pure form of expression. There's no one to interpret the words from the writer to the reader."
Still, the transition from writing action slug lines to smooth literary prose can be bumpier than a jump-cut in a Tarantino film. According to book agent Mary Evans, the fact that a screenwriter has written a manuscript has no bearing on whether his or her book will have even a modicum of writerly competence.
"Oftentimes, you shudder when a screenwriter sends you a novel, because they tend to be strong with dialogue but crappy with context, and novels are all about creating the proper context for the story," said Evans, whose clients include Smith and Michael Chabon. "Screenwriters are attracted to novel writing because they can let their freak flag fly and just write what they want, but the truly talented novelist-slash-screenwriter is very rare."
